School code rewrite plan remains unresolved

TALLAHASSEE -- State lawmakers ended their special session Friday without doing the one thing that Gov. Jeb Bush called them back to the Capitol to do: rewrite the Florida school code.

A fight over religion in schools erupted in the Senate, which refused for the second time in two weeks to pass the mammoth school code rewrite.

Gov. Jeb Bush immediately said he would haul lawmakers back to Tallahassee to try again next week.

Clearly frustrated, Bush called Friday's developments "absolutely ridiculous" and criticized the state Senate for balking at passing the legislation because of a provision that allows students to pray and speak about religion in school.

"It's one page out of an 1,800-page document," Bush said. "I'm very frustrated."

A joint House-Senate committee reached agreement late Thursday on a compromise version of the bill, which some believe to be the biggest bill ever considered in the Legislature.

House Speaker Tom Feeney, R-Oviedo, said Friday the Senate should support the compromise.

"The House believes strongly that when you give your word and you give your commitment that you live up to it," he said.

But Senate Democrats criticized the religious rights provision of the bill Friday morning and it became clear as the morning progressed that some Senate Republicans also had concerns.

"The opposition spread like wildfire," Senate President John McKay, R-Bradenton, said later. "It was almost spontaneous combustion."

The provision says students have the right to pray, express their religious believes in homework, distribute religious literature and speak to other students about religion.

"We could have the church of devil worship or we could have the church of witchcraft or we could have the church of the Taliban," warned Sen. Ginny Brown-Waite, R-Brooksville.

The House voted 74-37 for the bill, which reorganizes the state's law books governing public schools, community colleges and state universities, and then adjourned.

The Senate was in an hour-long lunch break when the House stopped work.

When senators came back, they said there weren't enough votes to pass the bill with the religious rights provision and then adjourned without taking up the bill.

There's no disagreement over the bulk of the rewrite, which is needed to reflect Florida's transition to an appointed state board of education from an elected board.

Lawmakers will also have to come back to the Capitol for a special session to write a budget for the fiscal year that starts July 1, another job they failed to accomplish during the regular 60-day session that ended two weeks ago.